


fall back into place

by sundermount



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: M/M, Mentions of PTSD, Post-Canon, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-09-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:14:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26253229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sundermount/pseuds/sundermount
Summary: Their initial arrangement was to be a temporary one.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Comments: 12
Kudos: 113





	fall back into place

**Author's Note:**

> Once again, all mistakes are mine.

Dimitri extends the offer to share his study when he comes upon Felix and his papers in the castle’s less formal dining space.

“It isn’t much, but it is warm and comfortable, that much I can guarantee,” he says.

It comes as a relief to Felix. The desk in his childhood rooms was built for a child, and insufficient for current use. Council meeting rooms, though serviceable, were a reminder of the long, hateful hours trapped there during the day.

“Okay,” Felix says, and hefts his papers into Dimitri’s arms.

  


Some who knew of their arrangement were unhappy, particularly the Adrestian nobles.

Unsettled by their perceived ideas of the influence Felix wields, they go behind his back. Whisper insinuations about how he had King Dimitri’s ear; buried them deep in remarks about how audacious Duke Fraldarius was, to inconvenience his liege in such a manner.

Dimitri does not take kindly to it. “I enjoy his company and having a trusted companion to confer with,” he says as a means of dismissal. His warning is clear.

“Imagine thinking I have your ear,” Felix grumbles after a long, drawn-out argument one night.

“You do, as much as if you were my chief advisor,” Dimitri chances.

Felix does not reply.

“I do appreciate your counsel and the perspective you bring,” he continues, unrolling a scroll from the pile by him and setting it in front of Felix. “Nevertheless, this is why you are wrong.”

  


“I’d like for you to stay here, if you wanted,” Dimitri had said. “By my side, as my right hand.”

Felix still feels too small for the title of Duke that he carries. The weight of what Dimitri is proposing—it is too much, too soon.

“I cannot.” He does not beg, but him and Dimitri both hear the plea in his voice all the same. “I don't even know how long I'll be here for.”

Dimitri's smile is a sad one.

“Okay,” he says. “But I will be here, when you are ready.”

  


Dimitri rubs at the bridge of his nose for the third time in a row, bringing the document he had been reading nearer to the lamp. Felix snatches it from him.

“Where were you at?” He asks.

Dimitri tells him as much and thanks him, grateful for the assistance he does not yet know how to ask for. He sheds his cloak and throws it over his chair, resting his hand in his hands.

“I should retire soon. I’m not in the habit of keeping extremely late nights any longer, but this—” Dimitri groans.

“ _With the approval of the Alliance,_ —go to bed, then— _the Committee on Technical Matters appointed a sub-committee to hold a trial census. This was over the Harpstring and Garland moons, of the year 1125…_ ”

  


It was not clear to Felix before, but he had been on a knife’s edge.

An impermanence in the smallest of matters—his working area—did more than it should have to unsettle him, and it is not until he fits himself into the space Dimitri carves out for him that he realises what was missing.

Felix takes to Dimitri’s study faster than he expects, in a way that frightens him. The first time a book crosses the half of the desk he’d marked out for his own use, he feels as if a boundary has been breached; as if they are at war again, and his safe territory usurped and intruded upon.

He pushes it back to Dimitri’s side.

  


“What do you think about this?”

“What do _I_ think? I’m not your advisor, Dimitri.” Felix reminds him.

“You would be, if you’d accepted my offer.” The sulk is clear in his voice.

“Pass it over,” Felix commands, attempting to shift focus back to the matter at hand.

Dimitri sighs in relief and rubs a hand over his face, sliding the report he was reading over to Felix. “Thank you.”

He tugs at a glove as if to pull it off and yanks it down. Repeats it again, with the other hand.

“Take your gloves off if you want,” Felix says, skimming the report. He makes a noise of disgust. More nonsense from Counts Varley and Hevring.

Dimitri’s hands still.

“It’s just us here, you won’t need to concern yourself about my judgement. If it helps, pretend I cannot see,” Felix says, rifling through his stack of papers.

Dimitri stands, moving away from the desk as he slowly works them off.

Felix tuts, not looking up as he chides him. “Don’t leave them on the chair.”

“They’ll be next to your Zoltan. You won’t let me forget where they are,” Dimitri counters.

“Says the boar who misplaced a thousand-page tome.” Felix rifles through the sheaf of papers he pulled and makes a triumphant noise. “Dimitri. Come look at this.”

Dimitri moves behind him and leans over to read the page Felix holds up.

“Regarding the powers that control the judiciary... It directly contradicts what the both of them are saying,” he says, plucking it from Felix’s hand for a closer look.

“Looks like you won’t have to revise another law to invalidate their petty squabbles.” Felix half-turns in his seat to look at Dimitri. He does not see why he had been so self-conscious about his hands; he thinks they look perfectly normal, if a little scarred.

Perhaps it is similar to why some of the soldiers they know cope with drink. Why Felix sleeps with a sword beside him and a dagger under his pillow.

The war left more than physical scars on all of them; Dimitri had both that and the Tragedy of Duscur to contend with.

  


Some days were worse than others, the kind that got so deep under his skin that an afternoon’s worth of running through sword forms was not enough to shake.

Felix unlocks the door to the study with the key Dimitri had loaned him. _If you ever find yourself in need of its use and I am otherwise occupied_ , he’d said.

The slight stuffiness of it and the accompanying smell clears his head almost immediately. He methodically clears his side of the desk, stacking papers and books to the side, finally setting his sword down along with a vial of oil and soft cloths.

He unsheathes it and places the scabbard in his lap.

Felix breathes in deep once. He uncorks the vial, dipping a cloth-wrapped finger in. He folds the cloth twice lengthwise and works it down the length of the sword; single-direction, straight motions until one side of the blade is fully oiled, until the vise on his chest loosens the slightest bit and he can breathe easier.

He turns the sword around, does the same for the other side of the blade before wiping it clean of excess oil. Grips the hilt of the sword once he deems his job done, raising it and watching the barely-there gleam of the blade in the light of the setting sun.

Footsteps thunder down the hallway. Just in time.

Felix sheaths his sword and stands to open the doors. On the other side is Dimitri, a tray with dinner for two in his hands.

“I got your favourites,” he says.

  


Although he’d been the one who suggested they share his study, Dimitri had also been the one who fretted the most.

It was a very _him_ thing to do; to think nothing of repurposing an unoccupied servant’s room for his own use, but Goddess forbid he subject someone of lower rank than himself to it.

Felix had been given prior warning, but it is still smaller than he expects.

An armchair, a wood stove, and a wide desk with two matching chairs. Lo and behold, the King of United Fódlan’s private study. Fairly isolated and impossible to approach without sound, the faintest whisper carrying and steps echoing like thunderclaps.

“It’ll do,” he’d declared, seating himself on the side of the desk that placed his back to the door and faced the window.

“I’m very glad you think so.” Dimitri had smiled at him. Felix still remembers the way his breath had caught.

  


Felix sighs and steps out of his boots the moment the door shuts behind them, and Dimitri makes a strange croaking noise.

Dimitri _looks_ at him, and it is a look Felix cannot read. He feels awkward and unsure in a way he has not ever been; not in front of Dimitri, and not in this space. “You said, at the very beginning.” He does not quite like the hesitant tone he is taking. “That I could make myself as comfortable as I wanted.”

“I did say that.” Dimitri sounds a bit strangled.

“Are you going back on your word?” Felix fidgets, crossing his arms defensively. He curls his toes, relishing in the freedom his feet are afforded before he has to put his boots back on again.

“No, but.” Dimitri swallows. “Your boots?”

“They’re new,” Felix says, knowing Dimitri will understand. They would be comfortable weeks from now, but he has yet to break them in.

Dimitri does not press the matter, having moved on to fiddle with the trappings of his own attire. Felix makes his way across the room, loosening his belt and shedding his sword and daggers along the way.

He sinks into his seat at their desk, crossing one foot over the other and sighing in relief. He’d suffered long enough in the day, with the reassurance that he could allow himself to be comfortable here.

Fortune does not favour him, however.

Dimitri calls an early end to the night, citing an inability to concentrate, and Felix grimly pulls the damnable, blister-forming boots back on.

  


Felix’s steps are careful and measured, and it is not until he is in the study that he allows his body to fully channel the anger that has been simmering, ripping his cloak off with so much ferocity he almost breaks the clasps.

Dimitri’s footsteps are heavy behind him. “I know you don’t like him, but his stance on this—”

He makes a point to scowl at Dimitri before leaning down to work his boots off his feet. “Whether I like him or not does not factor into this.”

Dimitri sighs, straightening Felix’s coat on its peg. “It sounds like it does.”

“My feelings don’t fucking matter.” Felix stalks over to his armchair, picking up the book he’d left there before settling into it, tucking his legs up and hiding his face in its pages.

The book had been sent by Dedue, along with his letter to Dimitri; he mentioned that Ashe thought the sword fights were well-written, but failed to include how they had all been byproducts of the titular Lord Valentin’s ill-advised, amorous escapades.

He can hear Dimitri coming up behind him, resting a hand on the wrought-metal frame of the armchair. “I wouldn’t want to upset you.”

“My feelings aren’t important. You’ve done worse to upset me.”

The tension that immediately accompanies his sentence is palpable. Felix immediately curses his own tongue. He reads and re-reads the same paragraph over and over. Blasted Lord Valentin, insulting the woman he would be courting.

Felix purposefully relaxes his grip. He will not indent the book cover and leave Dimitri a physical reminder of his misstep.

He reaches above him, fumbling for Dimitri’s hand, hooking their pinkies and tugging at it. It was how he approached Dimitri when they were younger, in that too-awkward bloom of youth when the physical affections people had cooed over in their childhood were met with a stern talking-to; not being proper nor befitting of boys their age and stature.

He hopes it still works.

“It’s over. Forget about it.” Felix’s pride is a horrid thing, his apology stuck on his tongue. His tone does not change, but he hopes his regret is plain in his actions. “And—you have a point. He has a good point. You should take his advice into consideration.”

He wants to be better. He is trying harder, but his own damnable temper makes things more difficult than they needed to be.

Dimitri lets out a shuddering breath. His pinky finger curls tighter around Felix’s.

“Okay.”

  


As King and Duke, they were prone to disagreements, and avoided speaking to each other unless necessitated when they were angry or frustrated. Felix was stubborn, and Dimitri equally so; not as patient and noble as most believed him to be, with Felix having had more than a taste of his reserves of pettiness.

The conversation is a painful one, but they eventually come to a mutual agreement to shed the day’s anger in their nights. Dimitri’s study had become a place they could speak openly and freely, albeit awkward and halting in the way that came with navigating a friendship that looked nothing like the one they used to have.

It is a fragile thing, this peace in this space of theirs, in the time they have hewn from their lives to be Felix and Dimitri again. Tender as an open wound, tended with a gentle hand.

  


It is a strange but familiar intimacy, this one they have forged of knowing someone off the battlefield. His hand darts out, moving the ink pot they both use to refresh their quills and angling the letter Dimitri had been writing.

Felix is not a fool; he will not stand for Dimitri’s upset and frustration over an easily avoidable incident. Such as staining an impractical, billowing sleeve, or accidentally smudging a carefully-inked paragraph. 

Dimitri extends his own dagger to Felix when he reaches for his stack of correspondence.

He is keenly aware of the number of weapons Felix has on him at any given time. And still.

  


Felix’s sigh is an aggravated one as he pours over the papers he’d requested from his uncle. An entire chest’s worth, which now takes up majority of the floor space in their study.

Dimitri eyes them, and Felix knows what he is about to say. He tilts his chin up at him and glares, daring him to do just that.

He backs down. Just as expected.

It is not as if Felix had not given Dimitri’s offer serious thought, after that first time. His desire to stay is at risk of consuming him the longer he remains; it is at constant war with real concern about how he would see to the matters of his own lands, all while juggling advisory duties.

He is _trying_ , but it is not an easy task. Not for him, who had never been intended as heir.

His uncle remains a steady guiding hand, his years and natural aptitude proving him invaluable. He is more than qualified to rule in Felix’s stead, but Felix is still the Duke in name. 

He can handle it. He needs to be able to handle it.

  


Felix tells Dimitri to take the eyepatch off, the fifth time Dimitri tries to scratch under it.

Dimitri does not respond. Felix looks up from his book. His hands are gloved, when they are usually the first article of clothing Dimitri sheds. His eye had probably been bothering him for some time; Dimitri uses his gloves as armour against the world and himself. 

“My eye, it’s...”

Felix exhales, hard.

“However it looks, I can guarantee we’ve both seen worse in the war.”

Dimitri’s hand creeps up to his eye again, idly tapping at a spot above his cheekbone. He grimaces when he realises what he is doing, and sets it firmly on the desk.

He rolls his eyes. “Take it off or not, that’s up to you, but I’m not going to be the one writing to Dedue when it gets infected.”

Dimitri reaches behind himself, but then sets his hands down again.

“Would you mind helping me? I think the knot is stuck,” he says. 

Felix scoffs, but moves to stand behind Dimitri. His hair is soft under Felix’s hands, silk the colour of wheat. He has read one too many harvest reports, if his inane babble has taken on the quality of one.

He works at untying the knot — easily undone with a pull and tug, but pantomimes a small struggle for Dimitri’s sake. It feels a bit silly, but the invitation from Dimitri to share in this must not have come easy.

Dimitri would have done the same for him.

  


Dimitri peers over at the letter Felix is scratching out.

“To the esteemed Count Gloucester and his spouse, Madame Blade Breaker the Second,” he reads out loud, in the dramatic tone he puts on when reading tales to orphans. 

Felix glowers. “I will stab you.”

“With that quill?” Dimitri inclines his head towards it.

Felix’s glower intensifies.

“In any case, that is indeed quite the title,” Dimitri says. “Would you have preferred something as ferocious and fearsome? We could definitely confer a new one upon you.”

Felix misses his shield, feeling the phantom weight of it on his back even now. It is still a reflex to move to raise it when he hears the sound of a blade being drawn, when he is caught unprepared by the sound of metal slicing through air.

“I doubt the populace would take kindly to having to come up with new rhymes for their ballads. They’d continue trying to immortalise me as The King’s Shield out of spite,” Felix scoffs, as he struggles to word his next paragraph. “Quick, before my ink dries. What’s a diplomatic way to tell someone to not be a fop?”

Dimitri’s smile is a small, pleased one as he guides Felix’s hand away from where it is poised over the letter, narrowly avoiding an unfortunate drip of ink from his quill.

  


He must have been more tired than he expects, because the moment after Felix decides to rest his eyes, he wakes in his armchair. He is warm, muzzy with sleep and resting under Dimitri’s cloak.

Felix curls tighter into himself, burying his face in the fur lining. It smells of Dimitri. Metal. The musty scent of old books. Lavender from the soap he uses. He keeps his breathing steady, to maintain the appearance of slumber. 

He finds it difficult to sleep well most nights; jolting awake at the slightest sound with his sword half-drawn, his heart pounding, and an inability to fall back into sleep after. Yet he had somehow managed to stay asleep, all through Dimitri carrying him from their desk to his armchair and tucking him in. 

So this is the extent of his trust in Dimitri. That it has been writ, bone-deep, in him.

  


It alarms Felix, the more he thinks about it. How easily he’d latched on to Dimitri; the ease at which he’d fallen into the rhythm of working with him as his closest advisor would.

He quietly finishes the work he has in the capital, packs his scant possessions, and flees for his own lands in the night.

  


Running does not solve his dilemma.

The month and a half he spends away from Fhirdiad leaves him unmoored. Fraldaius Manor feels foreign, a bed he has occupied for majority of his life more alien to him than the one in Garreg Mach, than the desk he shares with Dimitri.

The constant nagging undercurrent of _unsafe, unsafe, unsafe_ that followed him around the castle shadows his steps here. Back there, it’d at least been tempered by Dimitri’s presence and remained blessedly, conspicuously absent whenever he retired to their—Dimitri’s study. He finds no respite from it here.

He does not sleep well.

Felix had refused to be a hypocrite, to do exactly what he’d disparaged his father for; leaving another to oversee the Duchy while he runs to Dimitri’s side. But he understands better now, this reality of being torn between one’s inherited duties.

He thinks about the key to their study, locked in a drawer that belonged to his father, kept out of sight.

The want and need to be near his King is poison he no longer seeks the antidote for. It festers in his soul and occupies his every waking thought, the longer he strays from Dimitri.

  


_I, ~~Duke~~ Felix H. Fraldarius, formally accept His Majesty's appointment as Chief Advisor and Right Hand to the Crown, and will begin my duties as soon as I return on the morn of the 28th day of the Great Tree Moon._

_P.S. Dimitri_ — _this is a warning to clear my side of the desk of your effects._

  


Felix opens the doors to their study and there Dimitri is, quill in hand, his back to the sun.

The tenderness in his eyes is unbearable, and Felix aches to kiss him. Instead, he moves to shuck his boots off before settling into his seat.

The leather of Dimitri's boot is smooth under the silk of his stocking as he takes his first easy breath in two months.

“Welcome home,” Dimitri says.


End file.
